TTP guns down three cops in Peshawar night raid

Three Pakistani policemen including a senior police officer were killed in a night time raid on a police station in Peshawar on Saturday. The Tehreek-i-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) attackers used sniper weapons with night vision devices in the raid.

The Pakistani media reports that this was the first time that such sophisticated weapons were used against Pakistani security forces. The TTP, also called Pakistani Taliban, took responsibility for the attack.

The killed included DSP Badaber Sardar Hussein and two guards Irshad and Jehanzeb. They died due to gunshot wounds to their heads and bodies.

According to a Dawn newspaper report, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Police IG Moazzam Jah Ansari said: “Sniper weapons or the night vision sights were used for the first time by militants in Peshawar”. He added that the government has already dispatched thermal weapons for the police. He also said that sophisticated drones will be used to trace the Taliban militants.

The official told the media that the militants had come from near the Afghanistan border and had also used hand grenades in the attack.

In another major attack on Pakistani forces, two soldiers were killed and many wounded during a large-scale military operation in Balochistan after Balochistan Liberation Front (BLF) rebels attacked the advancing army.

In a media statement, the BLF said that its fighters ambushed Pakistani forces at Nokai Rah in Dasht with heavy weapons on Thursday and the two sides clashed again on Friday resulting in the deaths of the two soldiers of the Pakistani army.

The BLF statement added that the security forces are carrying out military operations for the last three days involving land forces and the air force.